Clemence the Insomniac Duckling - part 4

Irma awoke at dawn, panicked at the idea of having slept. She’d had an uneasy night. Herons had visited her in her dreams haunting her with reminders that her ducklings wouldn’t reach adulthood.

She’d sped off to the shelter where they slept and counted. This revealed 6 little bodies, alive and beating. She counted again, unsure of herself.

Had she really slept? Or had she had tea with aging herons over at the Lyons tea room in the city center? She’d immediately thought of waking Doug. Perhaps he’d know where Clemence had gone. But decided against it.

Instead she scanned the area thouroughy, questioning the ants instead of eating them, she didn’t have the stomach for breakfast. She was gone all day. When she returned to their settlement in the evening she had fabricated a story to tell Doug and the children. One that would neither put the blame on her bad parenting, nor on her distrustful genes.

She told him that Clemence had been attacked by a wild cat, that she had sustained serious injuries and that the Doctors at the clinic had been unable to save her. He was distraught, asking to see his daughter, his eyes spilling with tears.

As a pedagogue and parent, Irma had decided that nobody would talk of Clemence. They would be a family of 6, and the 7th, if ever mentioned, would be put down as a figment of the children’s imagination. She thought of herself as a modern Mum with none disclosure parenting techniques. She thought she was protecting her children and herself from undue sorrow and regret. And yet she sensed her daughter was alive. She knew she would never have been able to tame that mischievous spirit, nor, truly, had she wanted to. Clemence represented the duck she had never dared to be.

Clemence the Insomniac Duckling - part 3

The sequence of events was as follows. With the season’s changing Mum and Dad had been forced to move their gaggle to a place where they could keep dry. They’d favoured shallow water and sheltered accommodation.

Relocating had proven quite the ordeal as the ducklings were still too young to fly. They’d finally settled for the night, and Irma and Doug had decided to take turns to guard their nest. First, Doug had checked on them, making sure that Clemence wasn’t faking sleep. She had the longest eyelashes of the lot, and they lay, restful, on her lower lid, indicating sound sleep.
Halfway through the night, Irma replaced Doug and, half asleep, checked on her brood. Despite her guarding duties, Mum had had trouble resisting sleep, exhausted by a day of moving. Her eyelids were pregnant with slumber and she had finally surrendered.

No sooner was that done, that Clemence had shot out of the bedroom. She swam as fast as she could into the moonlight. She was free. She was a dolphin, a fish, a shark and a boat. She was everything she’d ever wanted to be.

Clemence had started to develop unorthodox thoughts from within the egg. She had at a time managed to convince herself that she was a parrot, she’d make sounds that, in her head, were loud and sharp. She grew feathers that were blue and red, and her beak was long and decidedly hooked. She was also an otter with four legs and yacht with a motor.

Most pertinent of all had been her inability to rest. She was a curious sort, always feigning indifference to get away with mischief. Her life had, so far, been predictable. She was fed, loved, and number 7 in a family of 7. She’d long awaited this moment, when for the first time she’d make her entrance into the world as a steam ship.

She chose to take the form of this manmade machine because she felt invincible. Just like a ship, she’d gathered speed and sailed away, queen of the tide. She’d fantasized about this moment every night as she lay awake, unable to give in to sleep. She’d attempted her great escape once before but was too exposed.

On that fateful night, she’d hid in the shadows of the reeds and blended in with the rocks and pebbles, having practiced shallow breathing and prolonged immobility. She had heard of human rescues, but feared nothing as she wasn’t a duckling, but a steam boat with wings. As the night drew to a close, Clemence had rejoined the herons of Willow Pond: her ticket to freedom. She’d only looked over her shoulder once, when she thought she’d heard Paloma cry for her. But it was a duckling from another family, and no concern of hers.